Genealogy of the Olmsted family in America : embracing the ...

CAPT. JABEZ OLMSTED, OF WARE, MASS.
(Introduction by Frederick S. Hammond, Esq., of Syracuse, N. Y.,
Compiler of the Hammond Genealogy)
The ancestry of Jabez Olmsted, who was born about 1690, is one of the
unsolved genealogical problems.
It seems strange that the parentage of a man of so much importance in
the locality in which he lived cannot be established with some degree of certainty,
but we must bear in mind the fact that the emigrant ancestry of a very
large percentage of the families who came between 1630 and 1700 is either
unknown or established by unsatisfactory circumstantial evidence. We have
our " Farmer " and our "Savage " and our " Hotten's Lists " of emigrants
but still we know that many thousands landed upon our shores of whom we
have no record whatever. The writer has found many circumstances in his
own genealogical work to prove this fact conclusively.
It has also been asserted on good authority that many came under assumed,
names to escape religious persecution and for various other reasons.
There are indications of other Olmsteds in this country at an early date,
not of the families of James and Richard Olmsted although possibly closely
connected with their families. It seems probable that Jabez Olmsted belongs
to one of these closely connected families. In the early Court records of
Preston and Norwich, Conn., we find references to a Mrs. Joanna Rose, widow
of Anthony Rose, who married second a man named Fleming and for her third
husband an Olmsted whose given name does not appear. In 1688 she was
living as Mrs. Joanna Olmsted, in Norwich, Conn. There does not appear
to have been any known member of the James or Richard Olmsted lines who
could have been her husband. Dr. John Olmsted had but recently deceased
in Norwich, leaving a widow, Elizabeth (Marvin) Olmsted, and it seems
probable that her husband was more or less distantly related to Dr. John
Olmsted.
It is possible that a solution of this problem might reveal the parentage
of Jabez. Sheldon's "History of Deerfield" mentions just two of the name: Jabez,
a soldier in the Indian wars in 1709, and William Olmsted, a Conn, soldier
who, with one Benton, was killed by the Indians July 31, 1704. This William
may have been the father of Jabez. The late Dr. Henry K. Olmsted supposed
this William to have been a son of Nehemiah and Elizabeth (Burr)
Olmsted, but a thorough search of the records at Fairfield, Conn., shows
that the said Nehemiah who died in 1657 left an only child, a daughter, Sarah.
The final settlement of his estate a year later shows a division between the
widow and this child, precluding the possibility of any posthumous child.
Genealogists who have undertaken to solve this problem have evolved
various visionary theories which when followed out to their supposed foundations
have been found to be absolutely without any foundation in fact.
Hyde, in his anniversary address at Ware, Mass., made prominent a tradition
that Jabez Olmsted had Indian blood in his veins. This is so utterly
improbable as to be scarcely worth the mention. If true he must have been
a half breed or at least a quarter breed Indian and no one of mixed blood
would have held a commission in the British service. There were Indians
and half breeds in the ranks and as scouts but none amongst the officers.
Furthermore a part blood Indian would never have married into a family
like the family of Thomas Barnes. Some other genealogist advanced the
390